Robbinswold

What a long day it was. She had slept well in the social hall at the Brinnon Community Church, and alongside her morning routine she shared the names of the contacts she had been making with the Jada Bascom Foundation’s Volunteer Support Team. She feels so blessed, she says, that they are following up on all of them. You never know which contact will lead to the enrolment of a life-saving donor.

Jada’s donor, Torsten, joined DKMS because of Michaela, his girlfriend then and his wife now. In the spring of 2006 a donor drive was held in southern Germany for a woman in their region who had leukemia. Michaela wanted to join and see whether she could be that life-saving donor, and she invited Torsten to come with her. He was not that woman’s match, but all the stars aligned that day, Jeana says, because Torsten was Jada’s perfect match.

Walking through Brinnon, she stopped at the Halfway House Restaurant. They were wonderful: they fed her a protein-filled breakfast of fluffy, delicious scrambled eggs and an English muffin, and they were so moved by her story that they decided to share information about the Jada Bascom Foundation, the walk and joining NMDP, the national registry, on their Facebook page. They have 4,000 followers, so that one interaction reached a lot of people.

She walked across the street to the Brinnon Mini Market for some protein bars, because she didn’t know whether she would find any food at Triton Cove State Park. She was able to buy two little protein bars and a small bag of peanuts with money she has picked up on the road as she walks. She and the clerk carefully sorted the change from her pocket; some of the coins were so worn that they couldn’t tell what they were, and those went back into her pocket. It felt good to know she would have something to eat along the way to keep nourishing her body.

It was 11:00 before she really hit the road, but she had got quite a bit of work done for the Foundation that morning, and she felt she could still make her miles before dark. It gets dark by 6:30 now, so she had to keep a steady pace down the highway. There were steep hills up and down Highway 101 most of the day as she walked along Hood Canal.

She reached Triton Cove State Park at around 4:30 and felt she could do a few more miles. She had seen Robbinswold Girl Scout Camp on the map, and walking there would cut the next day’s walk from 13 miles to 11, so she kept going, hoping that, as at many camps, someone would be looking after it in the off-season. By 5:30 it was getting very dark. Sunset wasn’t until 6:30, but with all the trees, and the sun on the other side of the mountain, it was growing cold and dark.

Coming down into the camp, she found a sign telling visitors to see the camp manager, which was perfect, and followed another sign to the manager’s home. Behind the glass door a dog was barking, and there was a car in the driveway, so she figured there was a camp manager somewhere who just wasn’t home yet, and sat down to wait. There was an outlet on the outside of the building, so she plugged in her phone and recharged her battery a bit.

Then she heard a car door shut. You know how it is, she says, when you’re out in the woods and sounds carry so beautifully in the silence. She got up, greeted the camp manager, Morgan, and explained what she was doing. He told her that he, his wife and the dog that had been barking had walked the Appalachian Trail together, so he understood a lot about her journey; he had been in similar situations himself. He offered her one of the empty cabins for the night, as long as she treated it with respect and cleaned up in the morning. That, she thought, was not asking very much. He also showed her a place to plug in her phone so it could keep charging, which she greatly appreciated.

She laid out mattresses and set up her sleeping bag. The cabin was an open-air one: the walls don’t go all the way up to the ceiling, and the roof comes down low so that rain can’t get in through the gap, but that also means it can get really cold at night. She took a corner bed and tucked herself in with the mattresses so the air wouldn’t blow on her.

Morgan very kindly came down with lasagna, garlic bread, Girl Scout cookies and some Aussie Bites. She had never had Aussie Bites, which are full of oats, fruit and nuts, and she planned to have them for breakfast. He also brought a thermos of hot tea, and that felt so good, because it was getting really cold in among the trees so close to the water.

As she went to sleep, she reflected on the people she had met that day, and on the hundreds of drivers in trucks and cars and on motorcycles who had passed her as she walked. As cars pass, she smiles and waves, or puts her hand over her heart, or nods: a gesture of recognition to the human being inside each vehicle. It is a way of connecting, she says, and also a form of gratitude to the drivers who saw her on the road and slowed down or moved over a bit, taking caution and care of a stranger walking along the highway.

Her host that night was Morgan, at Robbinswold Girl Scout Camp.